*Review* 3A Real Steel Noisy Boy

INTRO

There’s been few collectibles that I’ve reviewed where I’ve found myself so conflicted as I have with 3A’s Real Steel series.

On one hand, you have the film from which the toys are based. Certainly, far from the worse film ever made.. but just as far, if not further from being anything I’d consider a classic. There’s not a lot of reason to get excited when someone points at a generic box and says, “Hey, that box is full of Real Steel swag! I can’t wait to see what’s inside”, said nobody ever.

On the other hand, you have 3A who have a knack for deftly tackling technically and visually challenging figures.  It’s something they do so well, they could probably make action figures pulled from Battleship Earth and people would still be hard pressed to resist picking up a figure of Jon Travolta on account of his. “amazingly realistic alien goatee and forehead weathering!”

And that’s just the thing. There’s a lot of reasons for someone to be interested in these guys. I know some of you out there really enjoyed the film and have been picking up the figures because the franchise and the characters are something you really care about. Just like I know some of you grabbed them because they’re really cool looking robots and you can’t resist a cool looking robot. I’m sure some of you even picked them up because you’d blindly buy anything 3A puts out, banking on quality. Those and all of the ones in-between are all perfect reasons I’d say, to consider adding some Real Steel goodness to your collection. For me, I take them for what they are, great looking and impressive toys.

The final bot (that I know of) from 3A’s run with the Dreamworks franchise is this big purple guy in front of me, the ever-so-glossy, samurai-esque, Noisy  Boy..

and he’s puuurty. Continue reading

*Review* Hasbro Star Wars Black Series II

Intro:

One of the biggest disappointments of SDCC 2013 for me was missing out on Hasbro’s con exclusive Boba Fett (with Han in carbonite). I stood in line along with a horde of others only to reach the end hours later and be told they were “out”. I was bummed.. but just a few days later, Hasbro let slip that the same version, sans carbonite coffin, would be released at retail in the 2nd wave of their Black Series. As the 1st wave had juuuust started to pop up on shelves, I knew I had a wait ahead, but I can be a patient dude when I put my mind to it. Once I had my preorder in, I simply crashed on my couch and set to twiddle’n my thumbs the months away. Fortunately for you, you can just keep reading to find out how the set turned out.
Continue reading

*Review* 3A WWR EMGY Dropcloth 1.5

INTRO

ThreeA, to me, has always been about robots. Even now, with all their Tomorrow Kings, Tommy Mission, Zombs and pointy chested, long legged vixens, big ol’ rusty robots are the first thing that pops into my head whenever the toy company comes up. It was in fact a random image of a WWRp Dirty Deeds Bertie that first caught my attention and led me, cash clinched in hand, to ThreeA’s doorstep. A few purchases under my belt later, still wide-eyed and bushy tailed as one tends to be when their toe is first dipped into ThreeA waters, I set out with the seemingly obtainable goal to get one of each kind of bot in my collection. At first, I was keeping to the smaller, more obtainable bots thinking the larger bot were just too expensive for someone like me who planned to only be a casual collector with a tidy, reasonable collection. Ha! If I only knew then what I know now.

A month or so into my earnest collecting, I accidentally purchased a incredibly well priced, WWR Dropcloth Slaughterhouse. At the time, I didn’t have a solid understanding of the various labels 3A tossed on their various lines, so the lack of the letter “p” generally tagged on the end of the “WWR”, escaped my notice. I foolishly believed it to be another 1/12th bot given the reasonable cost.

Foolishly or not, when the dual hatchet wielding, 1/6 bot arrived on my doorstep, I was thrilled. While a WWRp Bertie reeled me in, it was definitely a WWR Droppie that truly sunk it’s hooks in. Dropcloths were and still are my favorite robots from ThreeA’s arsenal of cool toys. They’re just so pose-able and fun to play around with. Also, their reasonable scale makes them easy to collect and display with a variety of other sized figures. I’ve rotated out, bought and sold quite a bit of my collection over the years for one reason or another, but I have one bot that is securely locked into my “if there was a house fire, grab that” mental category, the WWR EMGY Dropcloth.

In my opinion, he’s simply the coolest looking bot I own, standing front and center on my shelf.

The EMGY colorway is understandably popular. In many cases, it’s rarity seems to be the driving point. But for me, it’s the stark use of  rusty yellow paired with dark black, silver and most importantly, red. Since the first EMGY WWRp bertie (speaking of rare), the EGMY color-way has gone through various changes. Newer bots, like Caesar and particularly Armstrong skipped the red accents altogether. It might seem like such a small thing, but in my opinion, it’s absence caused the newer bots to come out looking a lot less exciting than the original. Even the EMGY grunt, which I think is just a sick figure to have, lacks basically any other color accents at all, leaving him with a color scheme an interior designer might refer to as, “the dirty banana”.

When ThreeA teased us with the first Dropcloth follow up back at SDCC 2012, the Dropcloth 1.5, I was pretty excited.  When it was announced that the EMGY color-way would be among the first available, I was even more excited. Once I saw that the paint app would be a return to EMGY glory days (ie: reds, blacks and silvers) I may have fist pumped the air, shouted, “YEAH BABY!” and held that pose for moment, freeze frame style, in true 80’s tradition.

ThreeA once again made the EMGY drop a random “rare” drop, despite it’s popularity. On the plus side, it was a rare drop seemingly far more obtainable than any other I’ve experienced. In fact, the first time I logged onto bambaland during the sale (which featured Peaceday as the regular drop) I saw EGMY up and purchased him with little fuss. Almost every other time I checked the site, he was still there. I like to think that whoever wanted him at the time had a pretty good opportunity to snag him.

With my personal EMGY history deets out of the way, I am thrilled to finally have EMGY 1.5 in my hands. Keep reading to see how well I think  he stacks up to the OG.

Here we go..
Continue reading

It’s been a bit! SDCC and other stuff.

20130702-122818.jpg
Hey gang!
As we gear up for San Diego Comic Con, I wanted to drop a quick note to check in and let everyone know that we’re still working hard on updating RtR with the latest and greatest. In fact, we have three reviews written, recorded and photographed. However thanks to our crazy “real world” work schedules, haven’t had a moment to edit them all for posting. That’s not an excuse… It’s just a fact. We’re a tiny family of toy enthusiast with real jobs and families and this site, as important as it is to us, doesn’t make us a dime. So sometimes, things have to be put on hold.
But we’re not going anywhere. RtR has always been about fun and sharing with the community our passion for wonderful toys that we find fascinating and inspiring.
As for the reviews, they’re coming back soon. We hope, though we’re not promising anything, to get the ones on the back burner up before SDCC hits in a couple weeks.

Speaking of which, we’re super excited for the San Diego Comic Con! Once again, we will be making the trek from our beautiful beaches here in Hawaii, to the most exciting and bustling mega event of the year.
Last year was our maiden voyage to the con and we shot a ton photos to give our readers a glimpse at the sometimes overwhelming spectacle.
This year, we’re stepping up our game. We will be covering the convention extensively with photos and HD video of artist interviews, tons of cosplay, panels and of course, toys.

To stay the most updated during the con, you should most definitely follow us on Facebook, Twitter and or new, hardly used Instagram feed at #radtoyreview. We’ll be posting steadily and heavily there during comic con a bunch of stuff that won’t necessarily make it over here to the main site. It’ll definitely be the quickest way to stay updated if you want to see practically everything we see, WHEN we see it, on the convention floor..

That’s it! That’s my sales pitch! We want to thank everyone so much for all the love and support you give our site. RtR has grown so incredibly much in the past two years its hard to believe. We wouldn’t be able to invest the time and energies to do it without ya!

See you in San Diego!

20130702-124456.jpg